Officers arrest break-in suspects

JENNA-LEY HARRISON

Staff Writer

The Lincolnton Police Department and Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office have been busy this week apprehending a handful of thieves in connection with several related and unrelated incidents in the community.

Officers from both agencies worked together to apprehend Brandon Lamont Odum, 21, of 129 Mauney Drive in Lincolnton, and Rahim Jermaine Oates, 20, of 612 2nd Street SW in Conover, on Wednesday with breaking into two city residences the end of August, reports said.

Police located Odum lying in some bushes Wednesday behind Charter Communications and Sheriff’s deputies aided police in setting up a perimeter search for the suspect near Colonial Village Drive, where Odum’s sister lives. Officers said they originally chased Odum into a wooded area behind the complex after he fled from the back window of his sister’s apartment.

That same day, police also requested deputies’ aid in apprehending Oates, whom officers spotted running into a wooded area near a home on Huss Street while on their way to interview a witness in another break-in case.

After erecting a perimeter around the area, law enforcement officers located Oates, too, lying in some bushes behind a home on Proctor Street.

At this time, both men have only been charged with break-ins at 332 and 333 Colonial Village Drive in Lincolnton on Aug. 27, each receiving two felony counts of breaking and entering, larceny after breaking and entering, conspiracy, possession of stolen goods and one count of possession of a firearm by a felon.

Odum obtained an additional charge for failure to comply-simple possession while police also charged Oates with a probation violation.

The day following the two break-ins, the Sheriff’s Office told police that Jordy Lamar Jefferies, of 134 Mauney Drive in Lincolnton, had pawned some of the stolen items at Hickory Pawn & Gun, according to a press release.

Police investigators said they obtained video footage of all three men carrying televisions into the business on Tuesday. Jefferies has yet to be apprehended.

Oates is also a suspect in at least one additional city break-in, police said.

Officers linked him to a cell phone they found at a home invasion Tuesday on Linwood Drive and plan to press additional felony charges against Oates in the future.

After they searched through three different cell phones in the case, police connected Oates to at least two of the phones and linked a third to an unidentified individual. Oates and the unknown party, who may also have also been involved in the Linwood Drive break-in, texted each other’s phones at the time of the incident, officers said.

Investigators have requested the individual come forward.

Both Oates and Odum remain behind bars, Oates under a $115,000 secured bond and Odum under a $75,320 bond.

Oates was released from a state correctional facility in June following a more than one-year stay for similar crimes committed in Lincoln County across February and March 2011, according to the North Carolina Department of Correction website. In 2009, he also received felony convictions for drug-related offenses.

NC DOC also showed Odum was released from prison in April after serving a 12-month sentence for drug activity in the county in 2011.

Tuesday break-in

In an apparently unrelated case deputies spotted two men breaking into an eastern Lincoln County residence, according to an agency press release.

A deputy had gone to the unoccupied home on the 4000 block of King Wilkinson Road for a “routine check” around 7 p.m. and spotted Joseph Ray Dills and Nathan Miles Self, both of Benny Shrum Lane, fleeing the property into a nearby wooded area, the Sheriff’s Office said.

While inside the home’s kitchen, deputies located one of the suspects’ cell phones and tools used to break into the residence.

Dills’ pickup truck was also parked in the home’s garage with an ID inside the vehicle revealing his name and address, the release said.

Det. Sally Dellinger and Lt. Tim Johnson both later interviewed 32-year-old Dills. He and Self, both 32, turned themselves into authorities that night, according to officers.

The suspects stole more than $4,000 in home appliances and each face one count each of felony breaking and entering, larceny after breaking and entering and possession of stolen goods, deputies said.

They remain under secured bonds of $10,000 apiece with their next appearances scheduled for Sept. 19.

Dills has a 2009 misdemeanor larceny conviction on his record in Lincoln County, NC DOC listed. His alleged criminal counterpart has a much lengthier record including a four-month prison stay for misdemeanor larceny in the county in 2008, a misdemeanor larceny conviction last year in Surry County and a felony larceny conviction in Lincoln County more than a decade ago.